Bench is an online bookkeeping service, not do-it-yourself software. A team of professional bookkeepers categorizes your transactions, reconciles your accounts, and prepares monthly financial statements, which you view through Bench’s online dashboard.
Bench connects to your bank, credit card, and payment accounts, and delivers year-end financial statements ready for tax filing. Higher-tier plans add tax preparation and filing, and Bench offers catch-up bookkeeping for businesses that have fallen behind.
Bench is a fit for owners who want to hand off bookkeeping entirely and don’t need complex accounting like accrual-basis reporting or inventory tracking.
There’s important history to know. In December 2024, Bench shut down without warning, cutting thousands of customers off from their financial records right before tax season. It was acquired by Employer.com and relaunched in January 2025. Since then, reviews have raised concerns about delayed monthly closes and support, and Bench’s standard service runs on its own platform rather than software like QuickBooks, which can make it harder to take your books elsewhere.
Before signing up, Long Island owners should compare Bench with a local bookkeeper who works in QuickBooks or Xero, so the books stay in a system you control.